But this year, the management of her apartment complex issued a directive: Any and all "religious symbols or religious words associated with Christmas" are banned from the public areas of the building.
The Anti-Religious Bigotry of Lawsuit Expectations
Even the word "Christmas" was banned. The residents were told to use "holiday" instead (an irony not picked up by the elites since the word "holiday" is derived from "Holy Day").
Read moreDawkins cited this example in advocating that atheists call themselves "brights." After all, atheist is a somewhat negative term because it defines itself by what it is opposed to. "Bright" sounds so much happier and, more important, smarter. "Bright" kind of reflects the high opinion that atheists have of their own intellectual abilities.
Read moreNow, the Institute is not some unimportant relic of communist days clinging to existence in a squalid slum attic. On the contrary, it has very close links with the government. The report was commissioned when Nick Pearce, now head of public policy in the Prime Minister's Office, was its director.
Read moreThe two Harvard scientists have noted that, while abstinence programs in countries like Uganda have proven their effectiveness, AIDS policymakers continue to promote condom use, and ignore the differences in AIDS rates among African antions.
Read moreNothing. The press is up to its old tricks. When I was in the White House, the press heralded me as Nixon's brilliant political strategist. Then within a year, once having built me up, I was called the "White House hatchet man" and a lot worse. The press loves to create monsters, build them up, and then take credit for slaying them. It sells papers.
Read moreIt has become difficult to hold true to strongly held beliefs. The problem lies in the fact that behaviors, once held simply as sinful actions, are being lauded as definers of identity.
Read moreThe media harp on the Pope's views on homosexuality, yet have remained relatively silent on a very similar position held by the leader of the world's Buddhists. In an interview with the Vancouver Sun in 2004, the Buddhist leader was questioned about homosexuality to which he replied, "For a Buddhist, the same sex, that is sexual misconduct."
Read moreThe controversy stems from a fundamental disagreement over almost every issue regarding AIDS transmission, prevalence, and prevention. While the United Nations Joint Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) and other international agencies insist that AIDS is a growing global epidemic that must be treated with massive condom distribution, sex education, and drug treatments, several high-profile scientists call the picture a "distortion".
Read moreOops.
Something just as momentous, in my opinion, just happened in the evangelical community. For most of a generation evangelicals have been romanced by the "seeker sensitive" movement spawned by Willow Creek Community Church in Chicago. The guru of this movement is Bill Hybels. He and others have been telling us for decades to throw out everything we have previously thought and been taught about church growth and replace it with a new paradigm, a new way to do ministry.
Read moreSartre's wonderful outburst of disappointed rage suggests that it is not as easy as one might suppose to rid oneself of the notion of God. (Perhaps this is the time to declare that I am not myself a believer.) At the very least, Sartre's line implies that God's existence would solve some kind of problem-actually, a profound one: the transcendent purpose of human existence.
Read more